Life is tough, but I'm tougher

Menu

Author: Thatha

Riri & Thatha spent Valentine’s Day in Riri’s house. Baking and Cooking is the theme of the day. The menu for baking is Chai & MatchaChoux a la Chantilly, and the menu for cooking is Japanese Hambagu with Raspberry Wine Sauce and Miso Soup.

Choux a la Chantilly (Craquelin)

First of all, Riri made two cookie doughs, the brown one is chai and the green one is matcha. Then, Riri and Thatha made the choux pastry.

Place the cookie doughs on top of choux to create “cranklin” crust at the top. Put in the oven. Tadaaa…!!! They are puffing up. Look how chubby these babies are.

Take them out of the oven. The two flavours of Choux a la Chantilly: Matcha (round) and Chai (oval).

The special heart shaped cream puff with mixed of matcha and chai.

Japanese Hambagu

The cooking begins. We tried to make heart shaped hamburg with a mix of beef and pork, but turned out differently. Riri magically created a perfect sauce for the hamburg. Balance of sweet and sour. The miso soup created extra sensation. The seasoning was just right.Add MediaThank you Chef Riri for the fantastic lovely hearty dinner. I love you more and more.

Cute Valentine’s Gift

Five different designs in a box

Out of the five illustrations, I like this one the most. It looks a bit like Riri and Thatha. This could be a cute wedding souvenir, just need to personalise the illustration. (*wink)

The last time I ate Nasi Goreng Tek Tek or Nasi Goreng Abang Abang with my mum was when I still took ballet class in elementary school. We used to buy nasi goreng from the street vendor in front of Sport Mall Kelapa Gading on our way back home. Today, we got stuck all day at home due to severe flood and nonstop rain. We got no ready-to-eat food, and there was no gas to cook instant noodle. We were extremely starving by 7 pm, so we decided to go buy nasi goreng outside our compound.

The fried rice turned out to be nice, much better than expected. It smelled very fragrant, not too oily and the seasoning was just right.

While reading the book of Ya Kun, The Top Toast, I paid a visit to a Ya Kun store inside Hotel Santika compound in Kelapa Gading Sport Mall. It is such a coincidence that the founder’s Chinese name is similar to my dad’s Chinese nickname. My dad is usually called Ah Loi, and my dad was born in Pontianak (坤甸 Kūn diàn). The Chinese character of Pontianak, the capital city of West Kalimantan, appears in Ya Kun’s logo.

The logo of Ya Kun has changed into white font on maroon background, whereas before it was red font on white background. I wonder why the year written underneath the logo is 1944, because according to the book, the founder, Mr. Loi Ah Koon, started the coffeestall business with his wife in 1936. The wife invented the recipe of homemade kaya and use it to spread on toast. The kaya toast became a bestseller snack companion for drinking coffee in the morning. At the same time, Mr. Loi added a secret ingredient to his own roasted coffee – Planta margarine, which is known as Blue Band in Indonesia. The husband-wife made a perfect combo, and the business soon became a booming success. Their hardwork paid off, and they were able to raise their eight children. I really treasure their experience in fighting together at their early marriage stage to build a happy family. This touching story somehow affected how I see Ya Kun Kaya today. I ordered the Traditional Kaya Toast Set Meal, which consists of 8 thinly sliced toasts, a cup of black coffee, and two soft boiled eggs.

I really like how the toasts are very crunchy, almost feel like eating crackers. The kaya jam was not too sweet, and the butter wasn’t overwhelming. I cannot wait to try their other menu: Crackers with Kaya, to taste how crunchy the crackers are.

However, I was a little bit disappointed at the quality of the eggs. The eggs were probably not at very fresh condition, so they had a little bit of unpleasant smell. The interior of the shop is modern minimalist. I should install this kind of grill in my future house, so that I can pack good toasts every morning for my husband to bring to office and for my kids to bring to school.

I’d definitely come back again next time, although the pricing is a little bit high for traditional breakfast. Actually, my parents’ hometown, Pontianak, serves similar style of traditional breakfast in much cheaper price. However, the history of Ya Kun has captured my heart.

Today I placed an order of Cottony Cheesecake birthday cake from Mary’s Pastry Lab. I chose this cake since Riri’s dad said he really liked the Tokyo Banana and wished that he had bought more from Japan. Riri said that his mum likes orchid, so I requested for orchid decoration on the cake. I practiced making a birthday card just like the illustration below, but I’m not sure if I can make as pretty as the example.

Here is the final presentation of the cake. I’m quite satisfied with the look, and I hope that Riri’s parents liked the cake. Riri’s dad took picture of a slice of the birthday cake with a glass of Cafe 21 2in1 Instant Coffeemix. My aunt introduced me and my mum to this Singaporean instant coffee, so I bought it for Riri’s dad since he likes coffee too.

One of my 2015 new year resolutions is to train my Chinese language skill by watching Taiwanese TV shows, such as 康熙來了. Today, I watched the episode on New Year resolution for parent and child. In this episode, four pairs of parent-child were invited, and each parent had to write a message to the child summarised by only two Chinese characters, and also the other way around.

For the first pair of parent-child, the 15-year-old son wrote 放心 (fàng xīn, do not worry) to his mum, whereas the mum wrote 学习 (xué xí, to study) to her son. The mum explained how she always sent the son to school and picked the son after school since first grade of elementary school. Now, the son lives in boarding school in the US, so she cannot send him to school nor pick him up after school anymore. The mum couldn’t hold her tears when she shared this story, and I was automatically touched and almost cried as well. It’s priceless to be able to see the kid grows up and get involved in every aspect of the kid’s life.

After watching the show, I start to wonder what would I write to my dad or my mum if I participate in the show. Maybe I will write 开心 (kāi xīn, be happy) to my mum, hoping that she can have great time everyday with my dad after my brother and I are able to run our family business well. For my dad, maybe I will write 享受 (xiǎng shòu, to enjoy life), because he has put in over 30 years of hard work to build a foundation of his empire. It is time for my brother and I to continue building the empire, to strengthen and enlarge the empire.

My parents’ wedding anniversary is just around the corner (January 29), and it is followed by my dad’s birthday on the next day (January 30). I still haven’t prepared anything for the two very important days.

Ramen Keisuke Tonkotsu King is a popular ramen shop located in the same building as Orchid Hotel, Tanjong Pagar, where there will always be lines of people waiting outside the restaurant.

Keisuke Takeda, founder of Ramen Keisuke, also created several other brands: Tonkotsu King, Tori King, Tonkotsu King Four Seasons, Tonkotsu King Matsuri, and Gyoza King. Gyoza King and Ramen Keisuke Tonkotsu King are located within 2 minutes walking distance.To compliment the waiting time, Keisuke Ramen offers free Japanese Barley Tea.

As an addict of spicy food, I was intrigued to try the Black Spicy Tonkotsu Ramen, as it is a quite uncommon menu.

Each small table is packed with eating amenities and condiments.

This ramen shop is famous for the free all-you-can-eat bean sprout and boiled eggs.

Yoshinoya recently opened a new outlet at Meli Melo Sentra Kuliner 3, Kota Harapan Indah, Bekasi. It is located in the same area as one of our business units, the 3-in-1 outlet of Barnival, Bakmi Naga and Seaside Suki. There are many other branded restaurants over there, including Sate Khas Senayan, Old Town White Coffee, XO Suki, Tekko, Duck King and Iga Bakar Jogja. If people ask me what I love the most in Yoshinoya, I’d answer without hesitation: hot chilli! The texture is very watery, almost looks like chilli sauce at traditional noodle restaurants.

Arab Street is an interesting neighbourhood in Singapore that is filled with rows of cafes and restaurants. I wanted to visit Maison Ikkoku partially because it is rated as top coffee roaster in Singapore, but my bigger reason is that the name sounds very Japanese and I expected to find some Japanese elements for inspiration. The facade of the cafe looks more European than Japanese.

The menu is very simple and neat, just like how small Japanese cafes usually are. I only see one Japanese element on the menu, the Wasabi Egg.

The interior design leans toward industrial design, as pipes are lined against the walls with light bulbs attached. The distinct design element is wardrobes on the ceiling. My mum imagined how chaotic it would be if the wardrobes fall off and hit any customers.

The space of the bar counter is quite small and the counter is only painted black without any decorations or patterns. The showcase at the bar counter displays several cakes that change seasonally. When I was there, they have Milo Nutella, Caramel Red Velvet, White Chocolate Peppermint, Molten Lava Cake and Grape Vitagen. The Grape Vitagen cake is quite innovative, as it consists of layers of peanut butter and jelly between moist grape Vitagen cake. Perhaps Riri would try this Vitagen cake since Riri loves to drink Yakult.

Both my mum and my brother ordered Hot Chocolate, but the two cups of Hot Chocolate appear with slightly different latte art. The top one is my brother’s, and the bottom one is my mum’s. The tulip latte art on my mum’s cup has more clear strokes.

I ordered Piccolo Latte. My dad wanted to drink traditional black coffee with condensed milk, but this cafe doesn’t have such combination as it focuses on espresso-based coffee. In the end, my dad had a cup of Hot Americano with extra fresh milk and sugar.